Pirates not scaling properly?

from GalCiv2 Forums
I've played through a few games now and I've noticed that the random events that generate pirates or rogue officers don't seem to scale very well. That is, the pirates/rogue offices tend to have extremely powerful ships and very large fleets of them... More so than any of the other civilizations in the game (which seems really odd to me). As a result, they tend to be a nightmare to deal with, and will usually decimate several of my fleets before I can get a handle on them. Last night I went ahead and finished a game via Influence just because the rogue ships were too tough to deal with (and this was when I was pretty deep in the tech trees).

Is this intended? Or is this something of a scaling issue with what the game is generating? While I don't mind the challenge of pirates or rogue officers, and think it adds some spice to the game... It seems the current ones are a lot tougher than what they should be. I don't expect to be able to send a couple of ships and wipe them out... But I shouldn't have to send dozens of my best ships to deal with them either (which is what is currently happening).

Anyone else notice this?
6,720 views 12 replies
Reply #1 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Yeah, I have the same issue. Once or twice I've actually gone back to my last auto-save to avoid pirates. Most of the time I just pray they attack another race.

-Dewar
Reply #2 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I had this happen a few times in a recent game where I was trying for a Technology victory. In fact there was only one other race and I was so far ahead that they kept trying to surrender, so I had to keep returning the planets that kept rebeling to my side.

I had a group of pirates arrrive close to when I had all the Tech researched and I couldn't build a ship to compete with their fleet. The worst part was their logistics were unbelieveable with a fleet of over 20 ships including battleships and dreadnoughts with huge offensive and defensive capabilities. I had to attack them with fleets of only three or four ships despite maximum logistics and miniturization. I finally just avoided them and researched like crazy.

I found that if you keep your ships out of their sensor range they will for the most part leave you alone. They seem to search out some ships and starbases, destroy them and then find a empty space on the board and did not move unless I had ships approach.

Hope that helps, but I agree the odds were way out of wack with the capabilities of the other races. Just hope they attack the other races and not yours.
Star Control: Origins
Reply #3 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I found that if you keep your ships out of their sensor range they will for the most part leave you alone. They seem to search out some ships and starbases, destroy them and then find a empty space on the board and did not move unless I had ships approach.


Sota like Reavers that way.
Reply #4 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I was playing a game where I had every single tech, including tech victory, but had tech victory turned off.
I also had every single galactic wonder and super project. It was an experimental game to see if the best way to get a good score was to click end turn mindlessly for 4 days. (Turns out is was, and the scoring is broken, but thats another topic)

Imagine my surprise when I encountered a pirate fleet twice the size and capabilities of the best fleets i could produce.

One can only assume the pirates have "Super duper extra extreme miniaturization" and "Uber unbelievable Logistics" somewhere hidden in the Pirates own personal tech tree.


Reply #5 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
and if they were too weak people would complain they were pushovers
Reply #7 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
and if they were too weak people would complain they were pushovers

And with "unbelievably powerful" and "too weak" being the only options, it looks like there can be no solution. Errr....

If the strength of pirate ships were based on the ships of the most powerful race, that would make things interesting. As it is, pirates being more technologically advanced than a species that has discovered how to transcend mortal existence doesn't make a whole lot of sense.
Reply #8 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
actually pirate ships don't have a very strong defense or it's just that my super ship type, just have one engine one life support and the rest is just weapons and armor and a VERY HIGH maintenance cost (maxed miniaturization) mabye the fact that I'm aligned good can help to withstand damage.

The result of one of these ship can be a pirate fleet destruction.
Reply #9 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
If they were half their current capability they would still be a challenge!
Reply #10 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
ehh, i saw pirates and they were pushovers (probably cuase i had HUGE ships with 200+ beam attack)

And no, i wasn't cheating. I just set tech speed to very fast.
Reply #11 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Sota like Reavers that way.


Now that would be an interesting mod
Reply #12 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Pirates can be a pain but I don't mind them too much usually. They seem to show up in two ways for me.

Sometimes they come the early game after someone has researched medium hulls. they have so so fire power but enormous hit points that tend to get used up. I'm not even certain that they can repair. The only time I have beaten one with a ship is with a first attack when their hit points were down. They love to pick off your early starbases that are undefended but if you have a well defended base, it will kill off a pirate every time.

When they come later in the game they have a fleet or two that is pretty strong but not unbeatable by any means if your military is up to par. Since I tend to play a fairly peaceful game I kind of enjoy taking on an opponent that is not an invasion threat.

I haven't seen any pirates in the new beta so I don't know how they perform